Ghee: A Lovely Fat

Ghee should be a part of every kitchen. Oh wait! You’ve never cooked with ghee? Wouldn’t even know where to start? Hardly even know what ghee is? You’re missing out.

For thousands of years, ghee has been a staple in Indian cuisine. Ayurvedic thought believes ghee is the ultimate in cooking oils, healing to both mind and body. The ancient Indian philosopher Charvak (3000 B.C.) once opined:

As long as you live, live happily
Beg, borrow or steal, but relish ghee

Relish ghee. Now that’s a philosophy to live by! Why did the ancients value ghee so much? What’s so great about it anyway? Consider this my ode to ghee.

Ghee is basically butter, cleaned of milk solids. In the west, that’s caused it to go by many names such as “clarified butter,” “butter oil,” and “drawn butter.” Unlike many new-fangled oils and fats, you can make ghee at home, on your stove top. Ghee has a golden color, a nutty and savory flavor, and (if you source it from grass-fed cows) a rich nutrient profile. Like butter from pastured cows, ghee is rich in the fat soluble vitamins A, D, and K2. It is also rich in CLA (conjugated linoleic acid) — the essential fatty acid found almost exclusively in grass-fed animals which is now believed to protect against cancer, heart disease, and type II diabetes.

Why remove the milk solids and water from butter? Separating the milk solids from the butterfat almost entirely removes the carbohydrates (lactose) as well as a protein that some people are sensitive to, casein. Evaporating out the water means the flavor of the butter is less diluted. Additionally, removing the milk solids and water also gives butter a higher smoke point, which means you can use ghee for sautéing, stir frying, or deep frying at high heats (375-485 degrees Fahrenheit, depending on purity).

What if you don’t cook Indian food?

How will you use ghee? Jenny, the culinary queen of the Nourished Kitchen,said:

While its heavily used in classical Indian cuisine, I rarely use it that way as Indian cookery makes only rare appearances in my kitchen. (I do love it though!) Indeed, I use ghee primarily in sauteing and frying where its beautiful almost nutty flavor is best highlighted. It’s a remarkably versatile and very under-appreciated fat. It’s better suited to a variety of dishes than coconut oil or tallow with their strong flavors. Even our locally owned movie theater uses a grass-fed ghee to top fresh popped corn.

So, why do I think ghee should be a staple in every kitchen?

Because of it’s flavor, nutritional profile, and versatility. If you have a hard time handling the heavy coconut flavor of coconut oil, ghee is the fat for you. If you find that tallow or lard simply taste too “heavy” for the dish you’re making, ghee is the fat for you. If you want a healthy saturated fat rich in antioxidants and essential vitamins, ghee is the fat for you. If you’re cooking at higher temperatures, want to avoid any potential complications from lactose or casein, yet desire that savory, silky, nutty, buttery flavor, ghee is the fat for you.

What are some of my favorite ways to use ghee?

Mix with a quality salt and spread on sprouted grain or sourdough breads.

Drizzled over fish, scallops, or lobster.

Mix with herbs & seasonings, use as a rub for roast chicken.

Use as a cooking oil when the flavor of coconut or tallow won’t do — particularly to saute or stir fry veggies.

Unfortunately, although ghee is available in the ethnic aisles of grocery stores and at natural foods stores, you’ll be hard pressed to find ghee from grass-fed cows. As far as I can tell, you have two options:

1) Make it yourself. Once you’ve got butter from grass-fed cows, it’s only about 25-20 minutes of work (most of it waiting over a stove, so does it really count?) to turn that into ghee. Diana at A Little Bit of Spain in Iowa recently posted a handy tutorial.

2) Buy it. Here’s the brand I buy. I’ve found that buying it in bulk can be more economical than making my own. And, in the very least, it’s less work!

About the Author

Kristen Michaelis CNC has been a Health and Nutrition Educator since 2008. Founder and CEO of Food Renegade, she's a passionate advocate for REAL FOOD -- food that's sustainable, organic, local, and traditionally-prepared according to the wisdom of our ancestors. She earned a Bachelor of Arts (summa cum laude) from Dallas Baptist University in Philosophy and Biblical Studies, then began her post-graduate journey as a researcher in the fields of health and nutrition. While she adores hats & happy skirts, nothing inspires her quite like geeking out over nutrition & sustainable agriculture. Nutrition educator & author of the go-to book on nutrition for fertility, she's also a rebel with a cause who enjoys playing in the rain, a good bottle of Caol Isla scotch, curling up with a page-turning book, sunbathing on her hammock, and parenting her three children as they grow into young adults.

Your resources page comes up with nothing for Ghee. Are you not able to recommend a Ghee bulk source at this time? I recently moved back overseas and while I’ve found it here in small quanities, I’d love to order in bulk.

Natalie — The Ghee is listed under both Butter and Fats & Oils. They might not be able to ship internationally, which could explain why the listing doesn’t show up for you. (Many of our listings are geo-targeted, meaning that the ads only show up for local distribution areas. So, while you might see an ad in CA, you might not see it in TX. I don’t know if that applies here, but I do know that *I* see the ad!)

I know we’ve got listings for your area because many of our suppliers will ship nationwide. Is it always that you get no listings at all, for any category at all? If THAT’S the case, then it is probably because you have javascript disabled (either through an ad blocker or just as part of your internet security settings). The entire page is pretty dependent on javascript to load.

I have a US military address (APO). So, I’ll look again. And, when companies don’t ship to an APO or charge steep prices, I ship to my parents and have them ship to me (yes, sometimes this is cheaper).

Yeah, it’s not showing up for me either. I can click on your colored ad and then nothing shows up when it jumps to the page. Usually, if something is blocked, like a pop up, my blocker will ask permission to open it, not completly ignore it…I wonder how many of your readers are having this issue. Maybe you could PM us who let you know that we can’t see it with the link (if you are an affiliate, they should be able to provide you with a link so you can still make your %)…

I’ve never even heard of Ghee before! It sounds great though. I going to see if I can get some tomorrow. I’ve gone back to having more saturated fat in my diet (without too much of course) after being mislead by the food industry for years about the dangers of it.
.-= Steve´s last blog post …Weight Loss Articles Current Health Articles Health Related Articles =-.

Thanks for posting about Ghee. Just this week I was having a conversation with some folks about it and we all wondered if you could use it to deep fry since none of us can find lard from acceptable sources.

Ghee is excellent for deep frying. Various brands have different smoke points, based on processing techniques and how thorough the removal of milk solids was. All of them have smoke points above 400F, many ranging up to 480F.

Thanks so much for the link 😀 My family is just LOVING ghee. We’re pretty blessed as we get our butter from an Amish farmer for $2.50 a lb! Jersey Cows, Grassfed!! Really, it makes the best ghee ever, lol 😀 Thanks again Kristen, you made my weekend 🙂
.-= Diana@Spain in Iowa´s last blog post …Introducing Simple Lives Thursday – A new blog hop- =-.

Wow, great article. I’m actually going to go out and get ghee to do some experimenting this week.

I’m a big fan of lighter fats/oils though. You mentioned that it’s not as heavy as tallow/lard, but it’s still a saturated fat. How does it stack up against, say, olive oil? Is a dish with lots of ghee still going to come off as overly heavy?

Thanks for any help you can offer.
.-= Edmund´s last blog post …Blue Duck Tavern =-.

Hi.
Well i didnt know that! I love a good curry from our local takeaway but do worry about the amount of Ghee in them as I always thought it was really bad for you. I have never cooked with it but think i will give it a try. Thanks

you can check out http://www.ancientorganics.com/
for ghee from pastured raised cows. The Ghee is organic, and the brand, Ancient Organics is found in Bay Area (San Francisco,etal, CA.) stores…and maybe beyond!

I use a LOT of ghee. I was getting ghee from pasture-fed cows from Purity Farms, but when I just tried to order, I found out apparently they have been bought out by Organic Valley. So if you want it in small quantities, I guess you can get it from stores which carry OV products. I was buying it by the bucket, so the hunt is on for another source. Love this stuff! I can fry eggs, etc. without it burning like would happen using regular butter that still has the casein in it.

oh … top secret is … it’s Clarified Butter! It is intimidating embarking on something new … can be paralyzing when it’s something so foreign. Doesn’t help that the mystery is still kept alive. They cook out the water & milk solids like the butter you get to dip your lobster or clams. Use it in place of butter or oils – like sauteing or cooking, baking that calls for veg oil or butter. don’t be nervous … take it off the shelf put it next to the stove and instead of butter grab this – then next you’ll have to try coconut oil, can be basically interchanged.

MEET THE FOOD RENEGADE

Founder and CEO of Food Renegade, Kristen Michaelis CNC has been a Health and Nutrition Educator since 2008. She’s a passionate advocate for REAL FOOD — food that’s sustainable, organic, local, and traditionally-prepared according to the wisdom of our ancestors. [LEARN MORE]